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Hizballah’s Ongoing Threat to U.S. National Security

March 8, 2017

Hizballah’s Ongoing Threat to U.S. National Security, Investigative Project on Terrorism, March 7, 2017

Most analyses of Hizballah focus on the terrorist group’s intervention in Syria or its threat to Israel. But the Iranian-backed organization maintains a significant presence in and near the United States, threatening national security. Current American proposals to strengthen borders and immigration measures may be limited to address this important, yet poorly understood, threat.

A recent Al-Arabiya article examines Hizballah’s North American threat.

It has the expertise to build advanced tunnels on the southern U.S. border, enabling Hizballah terrorists and Mexican cartel operatives to infiltrate the United States. Relations between Iranian-backed proxies, including Hizballah, and Latin American drug cartels are well established. Mexican gang members learn from Hizballah’s combat experience and use of advanced weaponry. Hizballah, in turn, derives a significant portion of its finances from the drug trade and other illicit activities.

In recent years, security officials in southwestern states noticed a rise in tattoos featuring Hizballah’s insignia among imprisoned drug cartel operatives. This surprising trend indicates a strengthened relationship between the terrorist group and Mexican gang members. In line with its foreign policy, Iranian operatives infiltrating Latin America seek to convert individuals to adopt its extremist Shi’ite ideology. Over the years, pro Iranian websites have proliferated across Latin America, in an attempt to cultivate support for the Islamic Republic.

Powerful Latin American politicians also help Iran and Hizballah penetrate the region and threaten the United States. In February, CNN received a 2013 secret intelligence document from several Latin American countries demonstrating ties between Venezuelan Vice President Tarreck El Aissami and 173 Venezuelan identification cards and passports issued to people from the Middle East, including Hizballah operatives. El Aissami “took charge of issuing, granting visas and nationalizing citizens from different countries, especially Syrians, Lebanese, Jordanians, Iranians, and Iraqis,” the report shows.

Iranian and Hizballah operatives have cultivated and consolidated operating bases in South America, especially in the tri-border area (TBA) of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay. With a large Muslim population featuring significant numbers of Hizballah sympathizers, the region is ripe for recruitment, arms smuggling and drug trafficking. Hizballah continues to exploit other Lebanese Shi’ite diaspora communities, including in the United States, to strengthen its presence worldwide.

In 2011, the United States disrupted a plot led by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in cooperation with a Mexican drug cartel to assassinate Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Washington.

The problematic nexus between Iranian-backed operatives, including Hizballah, and Mexican drug cartels allows terrorists to earn big money to fuel their violent operations. These connections also enable Hizballah to make inroads into the United States through its porous border with Mexico.

American intelligence reports show that Hizballah maintains a significant network of sleeper cells in the United States. Though Hizballah has not conducted a major attack on U.S. soil, the group could decide to strike key American sites should U.S.-Iran relations deteriorate substantially. Preparations to combat Islamist terrorism broadly should strongly consider the nuanced and growing Hizballah threat to U.S. national security.

 

Categories: Drug gangs in Mexico, Hezbollah in Latin America, Immigration law enforcement, Iranian proxies, Mexican cartels, U.S. borders
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‘Sanctuary Cities’ vs. National Security and Public Safety

November 22, 2016

‘Sanctuary Cities’ vs. National Security and Public Safety, Front Page Magazine, Michael Cutler, November 22, 2016

(America has immigration laws. It is the duty of the Executive Branch to enforce them. It is not the proper function of the President to change them or to prevent their enforcement, as Obama has done by executive order and otherwise. Congress should pass whatever additional legislation is needed to stem the flow of Federal funding to sanctuary enclaves. — DM)

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Why ‘sanctuary city’ mayors should be given an MVP Award by ISIS and drug cartels.

The lunacy of the immigration executive orders and other actions of the Obama administration to block the enforcement of our immigration laws and immigration anarchy will be brought to a screeching halt on the day that Donald Trump replaces Mr. Obama in the Oval Office.

However the “Immigration All-Clear” will not be sounded across the United States in cities and states that have been declared “Sanctuaries” by the mayors and governors who have created a false and very dangerous narrative that equates immigration law enforcement with racism and bigotry.

This insidious false claim has been heartily embraced by the demonstrators who are rampaging across the United States to protest the election of Donald Trump and his promises to secure the U.S./Mexican border and enforce our immigration laws.

This is the false narrative that has enabled mayors of so-called “Sanctuary Cities” to foist this lunacy on the residents of their cities and was the focus of my article, “Terrorism, Enclaves and Sanctuary Cities: How sanctuary cities facilitate the growth of terror enclaves in America.”

The challenge for the Trump administration and for all Americans, is to eliminate these enclaves of lawlessness.

Sanctuary cities are highly attractive to illegal aliens and the criminals, fugitives and likely terrorists among them who entered the United States by evading the inspections process conducted at ports of entry by the CBP (Customs and Border Protection) inspectors and are vulnerable to arrest and removal (deportation).

Sanctuary cities, however, certainly do not provide “sanctuary” for the residents of those cities who, all too often, fall victim to the crimes committed by these criminal aliens.  However, what is generally not understood is that Sanctuary Cities endanger every person in the United States, no matter where they live.

Terrorists would most likely seek to set up shop in sanctuary cities to evade detection and arrest.

They can use the security provided by such “leaders” as Chicago’s Rahm Emanuel and New York’s Bill de Blasio as a staging area for attacks they might carry out in the cities where they live or in other cities they could easily travel to on the day of an attack.

While politicians from both parties often claim that the “Immigration system is broken” as a way of justifying their positions of advocacy for massive amnesty programs and the creation of these dangerous “sanctuaries” for criminals, fugitives and terrorists, in reality, this is “Immigration Failure — By Design.”

America’s borders and immigration laws are our first line of defense and last line of defense against international terrorists, transnational criminals, fugitives from justice and those foreign nationals who would displace American workers wrecking havoc on the lives of those Americans and their families when they lose their jobs and their paychecks.

A quick review of a section of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA)- Title 8, United States Code, Section 1182 would quickly dispel the bogus claim that equates the enforcement of our immigration laws with racism.

That section of law enumerates the categories of aliens who are to be excluded. Among these classes of aliens who are to be prevented from entering the United States are aliens who suffer from dangerous communicable, diseases or extreme mental illness.

Additionally, convicted felons, human rights violators, war criminals, terrorists and spies are to be excluded as well as aliens who would seek unlawful employment thus displacing American workers or driving down the wages of American workers who are similarly employed and aliens who would likely become public charges.

It is vital to note that our immigration laws make absolutely no distinction in any way, shape of form as to the race, religion or ethnicity of any alien.

The Joint Terrorism Task Force (JTTF) is a multi-agency federal task force that operates under the aegis of the FBI.  While, as might be expected, the FBI contributes the greatest number of enforcement personnel to that effort, the second largest contingent of agents assigned to the JTTF are special agents of  Immigration and Customs Enforcement / Homeland Security Investigations (ICE/HSI).

The majority of international terrorists also commit immigration law violations including visa fraud, immigration benefit fraud and a list of other crimes which include immigration law violations.

To provide you with such an example, consider my commentary, “Immigration Fraud Linked To San Bernardino Jihadist’s Family: Alleged supplier of material support now also charged with marriage fraud.”

This quote from the official report, “9/11 and  Terrorist Travel” identifies the nexus between systemic failures of the immigration system and vulnerability to terror attacks in the United States.

Thus, abuse of the immigration system and a lack of interior immigration enforcement were unwittingly working together to support terrorist activity. It would remain largely unknown, since no agency of the United States government analyzed terrorist travel patterns until after 9/11. This lack of attention meant that critical opportunities to disrupt terrorist travel and, therefore, deadly terrorist operations were missed.

That quote also underscores the importance of enforcing our immigration laws from within the interior of the United States and how failures of such efforts create deadly vulnerabilities for the United States.  This concern was the focus of my recent article, “Immigration and the Terrorist Threat: How our leaders are spawning catastrophe.”

As an INS agent I investigated and arrested aliens from countries from around the world.  My colleagues and I did not single out violators of immigration laws on the basis of race, religion or ethnicity.

For about three years I was assigned as the Marine Intelligence Officer for the INS New York District Office.  I was responsible for joining members of the Coast Guard and U.S. Customs in boarding ships in and around the New York City area to search for contraband, stow-ways and ship-jumpers (crew members who absconded and failed to return to their vessels before they departed from the United States.)

While such vessels provided individuals from many countries the opportunity to gain illegal access to the United States, the majority of crew members who went “missing” were citizens of Greece.

As part of my duties I was responsible for tracking down those aliens wherever they lived and worked and took the into custody to arrange for their deportation from the United States.

Members of the Greek community frequently complained to me that the INS was only concerned about Greeks.

When I worked on several investigations concerning organized crime, we often heard members of the Italian immigrant community complain that we were targeting Italians.

When we partnered with the Public Morals Division of the NYPD to raid brothels to shut down those locations in China Town, local resident grumbled about how unfair this was to the Asian community.

In reality the “targeting” that we did at the INS involved law violators irrespective of race, religion or ethnicity.

Period.

However, because of the utterly false and irresponsible Orwellian narrative created by the open borders immigration anarchists, incredibly, many gullible and misinformed Americans have been conned into believing that opposing fair and effective enforcement of our immigration laws is an act of heroism and a way of fighting prejudice and bigotry.

On November 14, 2016 NPR reported, “Mayor Rahm Emanuel: ‘Chicago Always Will Be A Sanctuary City’.”

That report began with the following paragraphs:

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel added his voice to the chorus of big-city mayors who say theirs will remain “sanctuary cities” in response to President-elect Donald Trump’s hard-line positions on illegal immigration.

Surrounded by immigration activists, business leaders and state and federal lawmakers, Emanuel sought to reduce the fear of immigrants living in this country without authorization.

“To all those who are, after Tuesday’s election, very nervous and filled with anxiety … you are safe in Chicago, you are secure in Chicago and you are supported in Chicago,” said Emanuel at a news conference called to publicize the expansion of mental health services for people anxious over the election results.

“Chicago has in the past been a sanctuary city. … It always will be a sanctuary city,” the mayor said.

His comments come on the heels of Trump’s appearance Sunday on CBS’s 60 Minutes, in which the president-elect promised to deport all immigrants with criminal records.

You would imagine that the mayor of any town would be thrilled to have criminal aliens deported to end the concern of recidivism and keep the residents of those cities safe.

Many mayors do see things that way and support cooperative efforts between their police departments and ICE.

However, the mayors of “Sanctuary Cities” and the governors of Sanctuary States have “done the math” and have, unbelievably decided that achieving political objectives is far more important than protecting innocent lives and the security of our nation.

Such politicians must not find “sanctuary” in the voting booth come their election day.

Categories: Crime, Donald Trump and immigration, Drug gangs in Mexico, Drugs from Mexico, Illegal immigration, Islamic terrorism, U.S. borders
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Reflections on 9/11’s Vulnerabilities

September 9, 2016

Reflections on 9/11’s Vulnerabilities, Front Page Magazine, Michael Cutler, September 9, 2016

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It is hard to believe that 15 years have passed since the terror attacks of September 11, 2001.

What may be overlooked as the news media discusses the attacks of 9/11 is that in 1993, more than 23 years ago, terrorists from the Middle East also carried out two deadly attacks in the United States.

On January 25, 1993 a Pakistani citizen, Mir Aimal Kansi stood outside CIA Headquarters with an AK-47 and opened fire on the vehicles of CIA officials reporting for work.  When the smoke cleared, two CIA officer lay dead and three other were seriously wounded.  Kansi fled the United States and was ultimately brought back to stand trial.  He was found guilty and executed for his crimes. He had applied for political asylum.

Kansi’s strategy of fleeing the United States after the attack is one often used by alien terrorists and criminals to evade U.S. law enforcement authorities.  These foreign nationals have a sort of “trap door” they can escape through and all too often, this tactic is successful. In the case of Kansi, however, because of the nature of his crimes, our government took the extraordinary measures of tracking him down and capturing him in Pakistan.  He was apprehended by American law enforcement agents who were assisted by Pakistani officials. The New York Times reported on his capture in an article published on June 18, 1997, “U.S. Seizes the Lone Suspect In Killing of 2 C.I.A. Officers.”

On February 26, 1993, a bomb-laden truck was parked in the garage under the World Trade Center complex and detonated. The blast killed six innocent people and injured more than one thousand and inflicted an estimated one-half billion dollars in damages to that complex of buildings just blocks from Wall Street.

That attack was also carried out by alien terrorists who managed to not only game the visa process in order to enter the United States and get past the inspections process at ports of entry, but game the immigration benefits program as well.

On May 20, 1997, I participated in my first congressional hearing. That hearing was conducted by the House Subcommittee on Immigration and Claims and was predicated on those two terror attacks.  The topic of that hearing was “Visa Fraud And Immigration Benefits Application Fraud.”

There were a number of additional hearings conducted by the House of Representatives and the United States Senate about the terror attacks of 1993 and fact that aliens seeking to launch terror attacks had been easily able to gain entry into the United States.

On February 24, 1998, just two days shy of the fifth anniversary of the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center, the U.S. Senate’s Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Technology, Terrorism and Government Information conducted a hearing on the topic, “Foreign terrorists in America : five years after the World Trade Center.”

That transcript and the transcript of other hearings have apparently been gathering dust. The hearing made it clear that failures of the immigration system were leaving our nation vulnerable to terrorists from foreign countries and yet, nothing of consequence was done about it.

It is notable that during the hearing Senator Dianne Feinstein hammered failures of the immigration system more than three years before the attacks of September 11, 2001 and included in her testimony this statement:

I am also concerned that we need to strengthen further our immigration laws and procedures to counter foreign terrorist operations. I have grave reservations regarding the practice of issuing visas to terrorist supporting countries and INS’ inability to track those who come into the country either using a student visa or using fraudulent documents through the Visa Waiver Pilot Program.

Now, however, when Donald Trump proposes blocking the entry of aliens from countries that sponsor terrorism, he is roundly accused of being an “extremist” by the media and by the Democrats.

Yet Senator Diane Feinstein’s comments about the wisdom of issuing visas to aliens from such problematic countries raised no such complaints in 1998.

Feinstein went on to state, in part:

The Richmond Times recently reported that the mastermind of Saddam Hussein’s germ warfare arsenal, Rihab Taha, studied in England on a student visa. And England is one of the participating countries in the Visa Waiver Pilot Program, which means, if she could have gotten a fraudulent passport, she could have come and gone without a visa in the United States.

The article also says that Rihab Taha, also known as “Dr. Germ,” that her professors at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, England, speculate that she may have been sent to the West specifically to gain knowledge on biological weaponry.

What is even more disturbing is that this is happening in our own backyard.

The Washington Post reported on October 31, 1991, that U.N. weapons inspectors in Iraq discovered documents detailing an Iraqi Government strategy to send students to the United States and other countries to specifically study nuclear-related subjects to develop their own program. Samir AJ-Araji was one of the students who received his doctorate in nuclear engineering from Michigan State University, and then returned to Iraq to head its nuclear weapons program.

The Washington Institute for Near Eastern Policy found in September 1997 that many terrorist-supporting states are sending their students to the United States to get training in chemistry, physics, and engineering which could potentially contribute to their home country’s missile and nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons programs.

If you think these issues have been addressed to protect us, you would be wrong.

On November 20, 2013, ABC News reported, “Exclusive: US May Have Let ‘Dozens’ of Terrorists Into Country As Refugees.”  This is not a new problem. On July 13, 2011 the Washington Times published a truly disturbing article, “Visas reviewed to find those who overstayed / Aim is to find any would-be terrorists.”

Consider that on September 2, 2014 ABC News reported, “Lost in America: Visa Program Struggles to “Track Missing Foreign Students.”

Here is how this report began:

The Department of Homeland Security has lost track of more than 6,000 foreign nationals who entered the United States on student visas, overstayed their welcome, and essentially vanished — exploiting a security gap that was supposed to be fixed after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks.

“My greatest concern is that they could be doing anything,” said Peter Edge, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official who oversees investigations into visa violators. “Some of them could be here to do us harm.”

Homeland Security officials disclosed the breadth of the student visa problem in response to ABC News questions submitted as part of an investigation into persistent complaints about the nation’s entry program for students.

ABC News found that immigration officials have struggled to keep track of the rapidly increasing numbers of foreign students coming to the U.S. — now in excess of one million each year. The immigration agency’s own figures show that 58,000 students overstayed their visas in the past year. Of those, 6,000 were referred to agents for follow-up because they were determined to be of heightened concern.

“They just disappear,” said Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla. “They get the visas and they disappear.”

Coburn said since the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, 26 student visa holders have been arrested in the U.S. on terror-related charges.

Tightening up the student visa program was one of the major recommendations made by the 9/11 Commission, after it was determined that the hijacker who flew Flight 77 into the Pentagon, Hani Hanjour, had entered the U.S. on a student visa but never showed up for school.

It was clear to everyone that multiple failures of the immigration system enabled all of those terrorists to enter the United States and launch their deadly attacks in 1993.  Yet while some laws were enacted to address the vulnerabilities of the immigration system, those laws were of scant value because the former INS did not get any additional agents or other enforcement personnel.  In fact, the Clinton administration implemented a program, Citizenship USA (CUSA), which enabled an estimated 1.2 million aliens to acquire U.S. citizenship via the naturalization process.

That process required that the applications be moved so quickly that thousands of aliens were granted citizenship before their fingerprints were run through the system.  Moreover, to make certain that the bureaucratic machinery was able to move at “warp speed,” Doris Meissner, the Commissioner of the INS back then, decided to streamline the process for conferring citizenship to the point that many applications were adjudicated without even a face-to-face interview.

U.S. citizenship provides the “keys to the kingdom” and is a serious matter.

The failures of the Clinton administration to address the vulnerabilities of the immigration system literally and figuratively left the door wide open for the terror attacks of 9/11.

On December 6, 2014 Fox News published a report, “Saudi-born US naval engineer allegedly gave undercover agent info on how to sink carrier” that focused on how Mostafa Ahmed Awwad was educated in the United States, became a resident alien and then acquired U.S. citizenship, and later agreed to provide an FBI undercover agent with the plans of the Gerald R. Ford, a 13-billion-dollar aircraft carrier that is still under construction and has brand-new unique innovations. Allegedly Awwad even told the undercover agent where the ship would be most vulnerable to being sunk by a missile strike.

I addressed the significance of the naturalization process in terms of national security in my article, “The Immigration Factor – Naturalized U.S. Citizen Added to FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists List.”

The “War on Terror” grinds on and numerous additional terror attacks were attempted by radical Islamists within our borders and in countries around the world.  Fortunately not all of the attempted attacks were successful and our law enforcement officers were able to identify some terror plots before they could be carried out.  Yet some attacks, such as the Boston Marathon bombing of April 15, 2013 and the attack in San Bernardino on December 2, 2015, caused death, injuries and mayhem.

Once again, immigration failures were behind the ability of the terrorists to carry out these and other attacks.  Yet the administration continues to admit Syrian refugees who cannot be vetted, and so-called “sanctuary cities” go unpunished for harboring and shielding illegal aliens from detection by the federal government, in clear violation of our immigration laws and the findings and recommendations of the 9/11 Commission.

The 9/11 Commission Staff Report on Terrorist Travel detailed numerous examples of instances where terrorists committed visa and immigration benefit fraud — including political asylum fraud — to enter and embed themselves in the United States.

Page 54 of the report contained the following excerpt under the title “3.2 Terrorist Travel Tactics by Plot”:

Although there is evidence that some land and sea border entries (of terrorists) without inspection occurred, these conspirators mainly subverted the legal entry system by entering at airports.

In doing so, they relied on a wide variety of fraudulent documents, on aliases, and on government corruption. Because terrorist operations were not suicide missions in the early to mid-1990s, once in the United States terrorists and their supporters tried to get legal immigration status that would permit them to remain here, primarily by committing serial, or repeated, immigration fraud, by claiming political asylum, and by marrying Americans. Many of these tactics would remain largely unchanged and undetected throughout the 1990s and up to the 9/11 attack.

Thus, abuse of the immigration system and a lack of interior immigration enforcement were unwittingly working together to support terrorist activity. It would remain largely unknown, since no agency of the United States government analyzed terrorist travel patterns until after 9/11. This lack of attention meant that critical opportunities to disrupt terrorist travel and, therefore, deadly terrorist operations were missed.

In my recent commentary, “Hillary Clinton’s Immigration Goals Would Irrevocably Undermine National Security,” I focused on how the fatally flawed adjudications process conducted by USCIS (United States Citizenship and Immigration Services), which has provided terrorists with political asylum and even United States citizenship, would require the beleaguered employees of USCIS to provide unknown millions of illegal aliens with lawful status under the aegis of Clinton’s amnesty program.

There would be no ability to conduct in-person interviews or field investigations, hence no way to verify their identities, backgrounds or possible affiliation with criminal or terrorist organizations.  There would be no way to determine when, where or how they actually entered the United States.

Ms. Clinton has certainly not learned the lessons of 9/11.

Categories: 9/11, Islamic immigration, Islamic terrorism, U.S. borders, Visa fraud, Visas and terrorists
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GOP platform gets Trump-ified

July 13, 2016

GOP platform gets Trump-ified, The Hill, Jonathan Easley, July 13, 2016

CLEVELAND — Donald Trump is putting his stamp on the official policy platform of the Republican Party.

Now, the party has fully embraced one of Trump’s most controversial proposals, explicitly calling for a wall that must cover “the entirety of the Southern Border and must be sufficient to stop both vehicular and pedestrian traffic.”

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Republican Platform Committee members on Tuesday voted to include language calling for the construction of a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.

And in a nod their presumptive presidential nominee’s support for a temporary ban on Muslim immigration, they also endorsed language that would impose “special scrutiny” of foreign nationals seeking to enter the U.S. from “regions associated with Islamic terrorism.”

Both provisions are departures from the GOP platform of 2012, when Republicans nominated Mitt Romney for president.

That party platform then called for completing “double-layered fencing” on the border, which was ordered by Congress in 2006 but never completed. It was silent on any special scrutiny of Muslims or other people from countries associated with Islamic extremism.

The language on a border wall is a significant shift away from the “autopsy” report written by the Republican National Committee after Romney’s defeat. That report emphasized the need for the party to appeal to Hispanic voters to win back the White House.

Platform Committee members described the endorsement of Trump’s immigration proposals as evidence the party is fully embracing him on the issues that have energized his supporters and infuriated his critics.

“Back on June 16 of 2015, Donald Trump proposed this, and it resonated with the people of America,” said Stephen Stepanek, a committee member and delegate from New Hampshire who endorsed Trump last month.

“So not only is the Platform Committee recognizing the position Donald Trump has held throughout the primary process, it has been endorsed by the American people, who have overwhelmingly supported his positions and overwhelmingly made him the presumptive nominee.”

Trump and his supporters have largely kept a low profile as the committee crafts the policy platform, which delegates will consider at the Republican National Convention next week.

But they have made their marks on issues like immigration and trade that have been the cornerstones of Trump’s campaign.

The only mention of the Trans-Pacific Partnership — the international trade deal crafted by the Obama administration that Trump vehemently opposes — was stricken from an early draft of the platform.

The language on the border wall passed unanimously through a subcommittee and did not attract any opposition or amendments at the full committee hearing.

It passed easily on Tuesday without any additional debate.

The only change to the immigration plank came when Trump supporter Kris Kobach, the Kansas secretary of State who helped write part of Trump’s immigration plan, interjected to ensure the platform would refer to “illegal aliens” rather than “illegal immigrants.”

Getting the wall built into the platform is a big win for the Trump campaign as it seeks normalize the proposals that some party leaders have been loath to embrace.

“The Romney campaign was very heavy handed about influencing the platform,” said Oregon delegate Russ Walker, who was on the Platform Committee in 2012 and this year.

“It’s far less that way this time from the Trump campaign. What’s happened is the current Platform Committee is in sync with Trump and using language in the platform to say the things they’ve wanted to say for some time.”

Trump’s promise to build a wall to keep people from illegally crossing into the U.S. has been one of the primary drivers of his insurgent campaign and a flashpoint for controversy.

And the committee has reworded its policy document to match the presumptive nominee’s campaign promises.

The 2012 platform said the double-layer fencing “must finally be built.”

The working draft of this year’s platform called for “construction of a physical barrier,” but Trump supporters saw that language as being open to weaker interpretations.

Now, the party has fully embraced one of Trump’s most controversial proposals, explicitly calling for a wall that must cover “the entirety of the Southern Border and must be sufficient to stop both vehicular and pedestrian traffic.”

Kelly Armstrong, a Platform Committee member and delegate from North Dakota, told The Hill, “I support the presumptive nominee, and so putting language in there to support his proposals is a good idea.”

“At the end of the day, a strong immigration policy is something Republicans will support, and we’ll support our nominee’s positions on that.”

But some Republican critics of the plan say it’s impossible to build a border wall on the rough terrain along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) told The Hill in an interview on Capitol Hill on Tuesday that adopting the wall into the party’s platform doesn’t make it any more likely to happen.

“It doesn’t really matter,” Simpson said. “You still have to appropriate money for it. Mexico’s not going to pay for it. There are places where a wall is appropriate, but you’re not going to build a wall down the whole 2,300 miles on the border.”

The platform does not address Trump’s promise that Mexico will pay for the wall.

And some Republicans have warned that the proposal will further turn away Hispanic voters.

Following the 2012 elections, the Republican National Committee issued an assessment meant to keep Republicans from losing the White House race again.

The RNC report warned that minorities “wrongly think Republicans do not like them or want them in the country.”

Now some fear Trump’s vow to build the wall, as well as his saying that most Mexican immigrants bring crime over the border, has reversed any progress the party has made.

“I’ve found you can’t look at the Hispanic voters monolithically — there are plenty of folks who came here legally who respect that process and do not appreciate people who ignore that process,” said Giovanni Cicione, a Rhode Island delegate on the Platform Committee. “That being said, those same people probably have relatives here illegally, so it becomes a difficult question.”

But most Republicans on the Platform Committee dismissed those worries.

“I’m not concerned about that,” said Darcie Johnston, a Platform Committee member from Vermont. “That’s more of a press narrative.”

For the most part, delegates on the panel viewed their votes as a reflection of proposals that have widespread support among grassroots conservatives.

They say they believe that bringing the platform in line with Trump on immigration will unite the party and capitalize on enthusiasm from the base.

“By the time we leave the Platform Committee meeting and by the time Republican delegates leave Cleveland, we’ll go home united and ready to support Donald Trump against Hillary Clinton,” said Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge, a delegate on the committee.

“You’re going to see a very united Republican Party,” she continued. “So many [delegates] have already come around. … A number of individuals are no longer talking about how they wish their candidate had won. They’re talking about what can we do to help Donald Trump.”

Categories: Donald Trump, Homeland Security, Islamic immigration, Mexico wall, Republican Party platform, U.S. borders
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Michael Cutler Moment:Obama’s Tsunami of Illegal Aliens and Deadly Diseases.

June 8, 2016

Michael Cutler Moment:Obama’s Tsunami of Illegal Aliens and Deadly Diseases via YouTube, June 7, 2016

Categories: Illegal immigration, Obama and uncontrolled immigration, Public health, U.S. borders
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DHS Quietly Moving, Releasing Vanloads of Illegal Aliens Away from Border

June 3, 2016

DHS Quietly Moving, Releasing Vanloads of Illegal Aliens Away from Border, Judicial Watch, June 3, 2016

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is quietly transporting illegal immigrants from the Mexican border to Phoenix and releasing them without proper processing or issuing court appearance documents, Border Patrol sources tell Judicial Watch. The government classifies them as Other Than Mexican (OTM) and this week around 35 were transferred 116 miles north from Tucson to a Phoenix bus station where they went their separate way. Judicial Watch was present when one of the white vans carrying a group of OTMs arrived at the Phoenix Greyhound station on Buckeye Road.

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The OTMs are from Honduras, Colombia, El Salvador and Guatemala and Border Patrol officials say this week’s batch was in custody for a couple of days and ordered to call family members in the U.S. so they could purchase a bus ticket for their upcoming trip from Phoenix. Authorities didn’t bother checking the identity of the U.S. relatives or if they’re in the country legally, according to a Border Patrol official directly involved in the matter. American taxpayers pick up the fare for those who claim to have a “credible fear,” Border Patrol sources told JW. None of the OTMs were issued official court appearance documents, but were told to “promise” they’d show up for a hearing when notified, said federal agents with firsthand knowledge of the operation.

A security company contracted by the U.S. government is driving the OTMs from the Border Patrol’s Tucson Sector where they were in custody to Phoenix, sources said. The firm is called G4S and claims to be the world’s leading security solutions group with operations in more than 100 countries and 610,000 employees. G4S has more than 50,000 employees in the U.S. and its domestic headquarters is in Jupiter, Florida. Judicial Watch is filing a number of public records requests to get more information involving the arrangement between G4S and the government, specifically the transport of illegal immigrants from the Mexican border to other parts of the country. The photo accompanying this story shows the uniformed G4S guard that transported the OTMs this week from Tucson to Phoenix.

Outraged Border Patrol agents and supervisors on the front lines say illegal immigrants are being released in droves because there’s no room to keep them in detention. “They’re telling us to put them on a bus and let them go,” said one law enforcement official in Arizona. “Just move those bodies across the country.” Officially, DHS denies this is occurring and in fact earlier this year U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner R. Gil Kerlikowske blasted Border Patrol union officials for denouncing this dangerous catch-and-release policy. Kerlikowske’s scolding came in response to the congressional testimony of Bandon Judd, chief of the National Border Patrol Council, the labor union that represents line agents. Judd told lawmakers on the House Judiciary Committee that illegal immigrants without serious criminal convictions can be released immediately and disappear into the shadows. Kerlikowske shot back, telling a separate congressional committee: “I would not stand by if the Border Patrol was — releasing people without going through all of the formalities.”

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Yet, that’s exactly what’s occurring. This report, part of an ongoing Judicial Watch investigation into the security risks along the southern border, features only a snippet of a much broader crisis in which illegal aliens are being released and vanishing into unsuspecting American communities. The Senate Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest addressed this issue just a few weeks ago in a hearing called Declining Deportations and Increasing Criminal Alien Releases – The Lawless Immigration Policies of the Obama Administration. Judd, the Border Patrol Union chief, delivered alarming figures at the hearing. He estimated that about 80% of apprehended illegal immigrants are released into the United States. This includes unaccompanied minors who are escorted to their final destination, family units and those who claim to have a credible fear of persecution in their native country. Single males that aren’t actually seen crossing into the U.S. by Border Patrol agents are released if they claim to have been in the country since 2014, Judd added.

Categories: Border controls, Illegal immigration, Lawlessness, Obama and uncontrolled immigration, Obama's America, U.S. borders
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Federal Judge Orders ‘Deceptive’ DOJ Lawyers to Take Ethics Classes

May 20, 2016

Federal Judge Orders ‘Deceptive’ DOJ Lawyers to Take Ethics Classes, PJ Media, May 20, 2016

(Cf. John Kerry: Enthusiastic Proponent of a ‘Borderless World’. How about a lawless world too?– DM)

Judge-Hanen.sized-770x415xc

In a stunning rebuke to the Department of Justice Thursday, U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen ordered annual ethics classes for the DOJ attorneys who were “intentionally deceptive” during the course of executive amnesty litigation. At issue was whether the DOJ intentionally misled the judge into believing that Obama’s DACA amnesty program would be halted until he made a ruling on a lawsuit brought by 26 states.

From November of 2014 until February of 2015, while the judge was still deciding the case, the Department of Homeland Security gave more than 108,000 illegal immigrants three-year reprieves. They did this after DOJ lawyers led him to believe that they would halt the program during that period. The 26 states who filed a lawsuit were thus misled into “foregoing a request for a temporary restraining order,” Hanen wrote in his blistering decision. “Such conduct is certainly not worthy of any department whose name includes the word ‘Justice.'”

Via the Washington Examiner:

The facts of the deception are not in doubt, Hanen emphasized. “[DOJ] has now admitted making statements that clearly did not match the facts,” he said in the May 19 opinion, first noted by the National Law Journal. “It has admitted that the lawyers who made these statements had knowledge of the truth when they made these misstatements … This court would be remiss if it left such unseemly and unprofessional conduct unaddressed.”

As punishment, Justice Department attorneys who wish to appear in any state or federal court within the 26 states that brought the lawsuit have to undergo annual ethics training. “At a minimum, this course (or courses) shall total at least three hours of ethics training per year,” he wrote.

In another case, such “egregious conduct” would lead him to strike the government’s pleadings, but Hanen decided not to take that step because the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the case in April.

“The national importance of the outcome of this litigation outweighs the benefits to be gained by implementing the ultimate sanction,” Hanen wrote. “Striking the government’s pleadings would not only be unfair to the litigants, but also unfair, and perhaps even disrespectful, to the Supreme Court as it would deprive that Court of the ability to thrash out the legal issues in this case.”

Hanen cited multiple instances in which Justice Department attorneys claimed that Department of Homeland Security directive announced in November of 2014 would not be implemented until February 18, 2015, even though they knew that DHS had begun implementing a portion of the order that pertained to the original “deferred action for childhood arrivals” policy announced in 2012.

Justice Department attorney Kathleen Hartnett told Judge Hanen during a January 2015 hearing that nothing would be happening with regard to DACA until Feb. 18, 2015. On Feb. 16, 2015, Hanen sided with the states and issued a preliminary injunction blocking Obama’s actions. Then he found out that the reprieves and work permits had been continuing all along.

That March, the exasperated judge chastised Hartnett for lying to him in January. “Like the judge, the states thought nothing was happening,” Hanen said. “Like an idiot, I believed that”:

A flustered Hartnett repeatedly apologized to Hanen for any confusion related to how the reprieves and work permits were granted.”We strive to be as candid as possible. It truly became clear to us there was confusion on this point,” she said.

Hanen seemed genuinely disappointed that he could not disbar the DOJ attorneys who lied to him, but he did ban them from practicing law in Texas:

The court does not have the power to disbar the counsel in this case, but it does have the power to revoke the pro hac vice status of out-of-state lawyers who act unethically in court. By a separate sealed order that it is simultaneously issuing, that is being done.

In the meantime, perhaps the court-ordered ethics classes will help the “confused” lawyers understand the concept of “justice” a little better.

Categories: Illegal immigration, Latin America, Lawlessness, Leftist perspectives, Mexico, Obama administration, Obama and uncontrolled immigration, U.S. borders, U.S. courts
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John Kerry: Enthusiastic Proponent of a ‘Borderless World’

May 20, 2016

John Kerry: Enthusiastic Proponent of a ‘Borderless World’ Front Page Magazine, Michael Cutler, May 20, 2016

john_kerry_senator_from_ma-2 (1)

How the Secretary of State’s globalist agenda renders him unfit for his job.

John Kerry’s Department of State is responsible for functions that are so essential to the well-being of America and Americans that the Secretary of State is in the line of succession to the U.S. Presidency.

On May 6, 2016 Time Magazine published the transcript of the commencement address Kerry delivered at Northeastern University.

Here is an important excerpt from his remarks:

“I think that everything that we’ve lived and learned tells us that we will never come out on top if we accept advice from soundbite salesmen and carnival barkers who pretend the most powerful country on Earth can remain great by looking inward and hiding behind walls at a time that technology has made that impossible to do and unwise to even attempt,” Kerry said. “The future demands from us something more than a nostalgia for some rose-tinted version of a past that did not really exist in any case.”

His delusional statement that it is impossible and unwise to look inward or attempt hide behind walls should give us all a serious “cause for pause.”  His blatantly globalist philosophies are diametrically opposed to oath of office and responsibilities and America’s best interests.

It is, perhaps understandable that Kerry, a key member of the Obama administration would not want Americans to “look inward” because looking inward will disclose the rot and dysfunction that America is now suffering from.  Record levels of heroin addiction, a rapidly shrinking middle class, wage suppression and contrary to labor statistics, record levels of unemployment by working age Americans.

On May 12, 2016 CBS News posted an Associated Press report, “Middle class shrinks in 9 of 10 US cities as incomes fall.”

As for “hiding behind walls”- metaphorically, our borders are America’s walls.  With the growing threats posed by ISIS and other international terrorist organizations and transnational criminal gangs and organizations, our borders must be secured and seen for what they truly are- our first and last line of defense. I discussed these issues in my recent video, Michael Cutler Moment: Obama’s Pathway to the ‘Borderless World’.

During his commencement address Kerry referenced the Boston terror attack- stating:

And as we were reminded earlier, you are still mourning the tragic loss of Victoria McGrath and Priscilla Perez Torres. Even before, on Patriot’s Day 2013, when Victoria was among those hurt by a terrorist’s bomb, this community felt the weight of a wounded world. So this morning, we grieve and we celebrate all at the same time.

Yet Kerry ignored that the Tsarnaev brothers, who carried out that deadly attack, were admitted into the United States with visas the State Department issued or that the recent San Bernardino, California terror attack involved a woman, Tashfeen Malik, who was admitted into the United States on a K-1 (Fiancee) visa.

While CBP (Customs and Border Protection) Inspectors inspect aliens seeking to enter the United States, the State Department issues visas to aliens who are required to secure visas prior to entering the United States.  It also determines policies concerning the admission of refugees into the United States.

Indeed, over the past several decades, most of the terrorists who have carried out, or attempted to carry out, attacks in the United States were aliens who had been admitted into the United States with visas.

The State Department is an integral component of border security and hence, national security.

The 9/11 Commission focused considerable attention on the lack of integrity to the visa adjudications process.  The preface of the “9/11 Commission Staff Report on Terrorist Travel” begins with the following paragraph:

It is perhaps obvious to state that terrorists cannot plan and carry out attacks in the United States if they are unable to enter the country. Yet prior to September 11, while there were efforts to enhance border security, no agency of the U.S. government thought of border security as a tool in the counterterrorism arsenal. Indeed, even after 19 hijackers demonstrated the relative ease of obtaining a U.S. visa and gaining admission into the United States, border security still is not considered a cornerstone of national security policy. We believe, for reasons we discuss in the following pages, that it must be made one.

Page 54 contained this excerpt under the title “3.2 Terrorist Travel Tactics by Plot:”

Although there is evidence that some land and sea border entries (of terrorists) without inspection occurred, these conspirators mainly subverted the legal entry system by entering at airports.

Each year roughly one half million nonimmigrant aliens who are admitted into the United States subsequently violate their terms of admission.  This should cause the State Department to consider how to more effectively screen aliens who apply for visas but under Kerry’s “leadership,” this has not been done.

Carefully scrutinizing aliens who seek visas and entry into the United States, especially given the multitude of threats we face today is not a matter of “isolationism” but of commonsense.

Kerry went on to note:

“Now, graduating class, I got to tell you, you really do look spectacular. I want you to – I mean, just look around you. Classmates of every race, religion, gender, shape, size – 85 countries represented and dozens of languages spoken. You are the most diverse class in Northeastern’s history – in other words, you are Donald Trump’s worst nightmare.”

That statement is disturbing for two reasons.  First of all, commencement addresses are not supposed to be campaign events.  Second- the statement outrageously accuses anyone who believes the United States must secure its borders- especially in a historically perilous era, is demonstrating xenophobia or racism.

Our immigration laws are utterly and totally blind as to race, religion and ethnicity.

It is also disconcerting, but not surprising, to note that Kerry expressed delight that Northeastern University has so many foreign students in attendance.  His State Department issued every one of those foreign students their visas.  On April 29, 2016 ICE issued a press release, “ICE releases quarterly international student data” that included the following:

Based on data extracted from SEVIS (Student and Exchange Visitor Program) March 7, 2016 international student enrollment at U.S. schools increased 6.2 percent compared to March 2015. In March, there were 8,687 U.S. schools with SEVP certification to enroll international students, a three percent decrease from the previous year.

Forty percent of international students studying in the United States, equaling almost 479,000 individuals, were enrolled in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) coursework. Approximately 417,000 international students from Asia pursued STEM studies, an increase of 17 percent since March 2015.

The ICE press release went on to note:

Other key points from the report include: 77 percent of all international students were from Asia. The top 10 countries of citizenship for international students included: China, India, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Canada, Vietnam, Japan, Taiwan, Brazil and Mexico.

I have written a number of articles on why educating so many foreign students at our universities undermines national security and also has a negative impact on American workers. Two such articles are: Educating Our Adversaries and Educating ‘Engineers of Jihad’ at US Universities.

Kerry used his address to decry poverty around the world and while celebrating the growth of the middle class in foreign countries, ignored how increasingly, poverty in American cities undermines U.S. national security and public safety and destroys the futures of millions of poverty-stricken American children as America’s middle class faces extinction.

Consider this excerpt from his commencement address:

“Today, extreme poverty worldwide has fallen below 10 percent for the first time in history. The revolution that is taking place on a global basis has brought hundreds of millions of people in India, hundreds of millions of people in China into the middle class. And while that’s welcome news, we’re not satisfied because 700 million people still have to survive on less than what it costs for us to grab a couple of Dunkin Donuts a day, because the gap – the gap that was referred to earlier between rich and poor – remains far too wide.”

The New York Post reported on the economic crisis in the United States in its article, “America’s middle class is headed toward extinction.”  This topic is one I wrote about in one of my earlier articles, Immigration ‘Reform’: Engineered Destruction of the Middle Class.

Kerry’s commencement address that touted the growth of the middle class in China and India, while blithely ignoring the economic plight of Americans and America’s middle class, made his speech far more appropriate for the Secretary General of the United Nations than the U.S. Secretary of State to deliver at Northeastern University.

Categories: Globalism, Immigration, Islam and terrorism, Islamic immigration, Kerry, Mexican flag in America, Obama and uncontrolled immigration, Obama's America, U.S. borders, Xenophobia
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The Glazov Gang-Michael Cutler Moment: Obama’s Pathway to the “Borderless World”

May 17, 2016

The Glazov Gang-Michael Cutler Moment: Obama’s Pathway to the “Borderless World” via YouTube, May 16, 2016

Categories: Globalism, Islamic immigration, Islamic jihad, Islamisation, Islamists in America, Kerry, U.S. borders
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The Real Flag Issue

May 6, 2016

The Real Flag Issue, Front Page Magazine, Lloyd Billingsley, May 6, 2016

Mex flag

Last year, South Carolina’s Republican Governor Nikki Haley signed a bill to remove the Confederate battle flag from the grounds of the state capitol in Columbia. The June 17 massacre of nine African Americans in a Charleston church launched efforts to take down the banner, which evoked racism, segregation and the 1861-1864 war between the states. Last July, when South Carolina lowered the Confederate banner for the last time, the crowd responded with chants of “USA! USA!” During the 2016 presidential campaign, a different flag issue is coming to the fore.

Violent anti-Trump protesters have been waving the flag of Mexico. The Mexican flag was on display in southern California last week, where one protest featured a child holding a sign reading “Make America Mexico Again.” Such fervor prompted a column from Marcos Breton of the Sacramento Bee. He argues that, aside from one public ceremony in Sacramento,  “the Mexican flag has no place in American politics, and it’s disturbing to see it popping up with increasing regularity.” This is hardly a new development.

When Californians vote on issues such as English as the state’s official language (Proposition 63, 1986); benefits for undocumented immigrants (Proposition 187, 1994); racial preferences in college admissions (Proposition 209, 1996) and bilingual education (Proposition 227, 1998) Mexican flags suddenly appeared by the thousands. This reflects the tenaciously held belief that California somehow remains part of Mexico, and that Mexicans are only coming to what amounts to their own country. They are therefore entitled to education, medical care, drivers’ licenses, welfare, and in-state college tuition. Politicians give tacit assent to this package.

Vice President Joe Biden explains that illegal immigrants are “already Americans.” In her recent book Hard Choices, Democratic presidential frontrunner and former First Lady Hillary Clinton helpfully explains, “after all, much of the southwestern part of the United States was part of Mexico.” So little wonder that Mexicans stream across the border, with additional encouragement from “sanctuary cities” such as San Francisco. There Sheriff Ross Mirkarimi welcomed even violent felons such as Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, a Mexican national and five-time deportee accused of gunning down Kathryn Steinle. In similar style, in 2014 two Sacramento County police officers fell victim to Mexican national and repeat deportee Luis Enrique Monroy Bracamontes, who said in court, “I killed them cops.”

Instead of restricting sanctuary cities, California politicians are more concerned with driving old Dixie down. A bill by Orinda Democrat Steve Glazer removes the names of Confederates such as Robert E. Lee from schools, public buildings and such. If politicians are in the mood for purges, they can find more fertile ground in Spanish colonialism.

Spanish colonialism was built on the enslavement of the native peoples they conquered. Under the encomienda system, native peoples were part of the land grants the conquistadores gave to Spanish settlers. The native peoples were required to work for the encomenderos, who considered them property. The white Spanish imperialists were also unabashed racists who exploited slaves from western Africa for mining and agriculture.

California’s chain of religious missions is the direct legacy of Spanish colonialism, as are city names such as San Diego, Santa Ana, Santa Barbara and many others. By the standards of the historical purge crew, these are due for some fundamental change. Los Angeles could become Mickey Mouse City and San Diego the Navy Base City. San Francisco could opt for “The City,” as residents call it now, or “Sanctuary City.” In all this fervor, the politically correct have lost sight of some historical realities.

The Confederate States of America lost the war of 1861-1865 to the United States of America, so it seems entirely fitting to take down the Confederate battle flag.  On the other hand, 168 years ago, a full 15 years before the Civil War, when the Ottoman Empire, Austrian Empire, and Prussia were major players, the United States of America fought a war with Mexico. Whatever the causes of that 1846-1848 conflict, the USA won and Mexico lost. Mexico duly signed the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo and the Mexican flag no longer flew over California and much of the southwestern United States. The rest should be history, but it isn’t.

“Donald Trump isn’t running for president of Mexico,” cautions Marcos Breton, but that’s how a violent faction of the Left sees it. The Mexican flag is their battle flag, and we will be seeing it more and more as November approaches.

Meanwhile, nobody is waving Prussian flags and yelling for “Prussian Power.” Nobody is posing children with banners reading “Make Italy the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies Again.”  But the Left wants America to be Mexico Again.

Categories: Clash of civilizations, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, Illegal immigration, Mexican flag in America, Mexico, Obama and uncontrolled immigration, Sanctuary cities, U.S. borders
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